It's taken 14 years to write this memoir about my visit to Byelorussia (Belarus) to work with a team of healers, hoping to help children victims of radiation from Chernobyl. I was working as an attorney in a Wall Street law firm, rotating through the corporate department, when I learned about Chernobyl and the designation of an international team to participate in experimental, hands-on healing work. Before participating in complementary medicine law and policy, I was exploring healing modalities and the effect on hearts-minds-bodies-souls instead of just writing legislation or articles in professional journals about medical evidence, standards of care, licensure, and other issues. Proposal (Short Version). Photo below taken in Byelorussia with children of Chernobyl (1990).

Informed consent presents one of the major unresolved areas in the integration of complementary and alternative therapies into the health care system. Legal requirements of informed consent aim to protect the patient against non-consensual interference with his or her body in medical matters. Informed consent requires the physician to disclose, and ensure that patients (or authorized surrogates) comprehend, all information material to the patient's decision to undergo or reject a specific medical procedure. Inclusion of complementary and alternative medicine in any such requirement is likely to have a significant impact on clinical practice....